The northern California hills, for a quarter century, has had it's home on the Monterey Peninsula. Eddie Lawson won the first race in 1988. Wayne Rainey won three straight races in 500cc competition. Nicky Hayden won twice. Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo have both won. Who will win the United States Grand Prix this year? Fans, you are about to find out. Read on.
This is the halfway mark in the world championship. 37 points separate the top five riders. Stefan Bradl is on pole. He has the first pole for Honda this year. Jorge Lorenzo had that monstrous practice crash at Assen. Lorenzo will ride, and has qualified sixth for this race. Dani Pedrosa did not ride in Germany. But, he'll race here in the United States. He is not sure he can win. He just wants to finish. Marc Marquez is on pole. He's been real fast. In qualifying, Marquez, on provisional pole, Marquez ditched his Honda in turn six, and got pipped by Stefan Bradl for pole by 37 thousandths of a second!
The Corkscrew is the most legendary corner at Laguna Seca. The track was built in 1957. The corner is blind. You have to be on the knife edge. It's an 18% grade, 60 foot drop. It's equivalent of falling off a six story building. Yikes! It is never flat or straight. The tire wear won't be an issue. 32 laps scheduled in today's race. Laguna Seca, at 2.243 miles, is the shortest track that the MotoGP bikes and riders race on. Cal Crutchlow has had the best season for a British rider since Barry Sheene back in 1982.
Right now, the rider's are alone, with their thoughts about how they'll run their race. We're getting ready to race. Guitarist Joe Satriani delivers an electrifying version of the national anthem, and before that, a moment of silence was observed for the late Andrea Antonelli who lost his life in an FIM World Supersport race in Moscow, Russia.
Valentino Rossi wants to win again. In qualifying, Marc Marquez crashed, as Stefan Bradl put his satellite LCR Honda on pole. Alvaro Bautista is third and is the fastest rider in a straight line at 167 miles an hour. The riders are on their warmup lap. It's complete. We're set for a start, now. The race to the Andretti hairpin will be big.
At the start, Bradl jumps into the lead, the bikes fan out immediately. Valentino Rossi has come to second. Alvaro Bautista was shuffled back. Lorenzo is phsing, going for it. Alvaro Bautista is fifth, coming to the corkscrew for the first time. Lorenzo and Marquez tussle as Marquez raises the front wheel. Down through the corkscrew, and onto the end of the lap through turn eleven. Bautista passes Lorenzo. Dani Pedrosa is sixth. Crutchlow is back there and so are the Ducati's of Nicky Hayden and Andrea Dovizioso.
Through Rainey curve THEY COME. Bradl runs fast lap at 1:21.815. Rossi is going to fight. Cal Crutchlow is closing on Dani Pedrosa. Crutchlow had a suspension problem in qualifying, and he adjusted the ride height on his bike as Rossi did. Marquez runs fast lap at 1:21.579. Turns three and four are the only flat corners at Laguna Seca. Marquez tries passing Rossi and he's off track! He sticks the pass! He gets by Rossi! Holy cow!
Marquez wants by Bradl as Jorge Lorenzo holds fifth. Randy de Puniet, out. His race has been run. Marquez continues chasing Bradl. Marquez runs a new fast lap at 1:21.539. Soon, the tires will drop off. The prototype bikes have the same compounds on the rear, and everyone has medium compound front tires. Stefan Bradl's father, Helmut Bradl, ran in and won titles in the 250cc division in world grand prix bike racing. Aleix spargaro has dumped his bike. He overdid a braking zone.
Rossi got 61 degrees of lean angle, and Marquez got 63 degrees! These guys can really push themselves on their bikes. Bradley Smith retires his bike. He must have had a mechanical problem. Stefan Bradl still leads. Fans watch the race from a hill at the top of the Corkscrew. Bradl and Marquez still lead this race. There are big differences between a factory and a privateer bike. They are different. The new bike is an evolution of one that came before.
Dani Pedrosa passes down the inside of Jorge Lorenzo into the Andretti hairpin. Marquez is running wider into turn eleven and that could be causing him to lose some time to Bradl. We watch the action from Marquez's onboard camera, through the twists of the first part of the course, coming to the Corkscrew another time. Hit the throttle hard, and feel weightless, like being in space. Rossi is third, 3.3 seconds behind the leaders. Two laps to halfway. Working lap 14 of 32. Rossi runs a 1:22.5. Cal Crutchlow wants to pass Rossi and Pedrosa, because he's on a satellite bike, while the two other riders are factory guys, but they're hurt.
Colin Edwards is up to eleventh. Good effort for "The Texas Tornado". Andrea Dovizioso and Nicky Hayden, are battling each other for position. Hayden will not be back with Ducati in MotoGP next year. That must be frustrating. He's a world champ and a two-time U.S. GP winner in 2005 and 2006. Marquez runs 2/10ths of a second quicker than Bradl at the halfway mark in the race. 16 laps complete. 16 to go. Alvaro Bautista and Valentino Rossi fight for third. Bradl continues to lead. He was not happy after not winning his home race in Germany last time out.
Bautista still hounds Rossi. If Bautista gets the podium, it will be his first since Motegi, Japan last year. Now, Marquez takes the lead away from Bradl. Will he sail into the sunset? Bradl has to push, now! Keep pushing. Get after it, sunshine. Marquez can turn the bike into corners harder, and Bradl wants to feed it into the corner gently, as the two leaders lap Lukas Pesek. Rossi is having issues turning his bike. Twelve laps to go.
Ben Spies will be back to race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway next time out, for the second consecutive MotoGP race in the U.S., and third and final U.S. round of the year. Dani Pedrosa has opened a gap on Jorge Lorenzo. He is chasing down Alvaro Bautista. Bautista runs a totally different suspension system than the other Honda bikes in the field. The lap times range between 1:21.9 and 1:22.3. Nicky Hayden passes Andrea Dovizioso and then, he has trouble. He slows down and Dovizioso passes. They got togther! How did that happen?
Bradl continues to chase down Marc Marquez. Bradl passes Hiroshi Aoyama. Marquez dispenses with another lapped rider... Yonny Hernandez. Five laps remain. Bradl will get second. Rossi wants distance between he and Bautista. He wants a podium. The top seven riders are running the same lap times. Colin Edwards tries to pass Hector Barbera. Marquez will break another of Freddie Spencer's winning records for being the youngest rider. Spencer won back-to-back races at a certain point in the 1983 season. Freddie Spencer won both the intermediate (250cc) and premier (500cc) classes at Le Mans, in 1985.
Two laps to go. Alvaro Bautista gets cheered on by his crew. Hayden sticks a pass on Dovizioso through The Corkscrew. Bautista is coming for Rossi. Marc Marquez is on his last lap, on his way to another win. It will be a second consecutive victory, and, a second in the United States, for Marquez, after winning at Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas, back in March. Rossi will not make a move. Marc Marquez becomes the first rookie in MotoGP to win at Laguna Seca!
#93 Marc Marquez ESP Honda
The next MotoGP race is indeed the Red Bull Indianapolis Grand Prix at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Speedway, Indiana, in three weeks.
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